Colorado Springs trucker reported missing

Fran Hall waits by her phone, wondering if it will ring and if someone - anyone - will tell her where her son is.

The 65-year-old Colorado Springs woman said her son Marty Weller, a local truck driver who left Colorado over Labor Day weekend bound for North Carolina, was hauling a load of beer in his Freightliner truck.

Weller, 47, stopped in Hurricane Mills, Tenn., to get a new alternator for his rig, Hall said. He called his fianc?about 10 a.m.
Sept. 1 while parked at a truck stop near Interstate 40 at Exit 143, Hall said, noting that nobody has heard from him since.

"I'm worried," Hall said. "I'm very badly worried."

Hall has been in contact with officials in Tennessee, North Carolina and Colorado and said, "They have not found the truck. They have not found the trailer. We have not heard from him."

"We've continued calling him over and over again," she said. "Finally his phone just stopped ringing and it went immediately to voicemail."

According to his mother, Weller is a father and has two grandchildren. He lives in southeastern Colorado Springs at the El Morro Mobile Estates.

A post on the Missing Truck Driver Alert Network page on Facebook says that Weller works for Billy Moore Trucking and was expected to make his delivery to North Carolina on the morning of Sept. 3.

A representative of Logistics Services, which handles dispatching for Billy Moore Trucking, confirmed that Weller never delivered the load of beer to its destination in Concord, N.C. The Logistics representative did not want to be named while the case is still under investigation.

According to the Missing Truck Driver Alert Network, Weller was driving a dark purple 1996 Freightliner with flames and Colorado license plate number 604XAJ.

Weller is described as 6 feet tall and bald and with blue eyes.

Anybody with information about Weller's location or the location of his truck can call the Missing Truck Driver Alert Network at 720-202-5606, call Colorado Springs police at 444-7000 or call local police in the area of the sighting.

Reports have been filed with Colorado Springs police and the Humphreys County Sheriff's Office in Tennessee.

Barbara Miller, a Colorado Springs police spokeswoman, said a detective is "working on the case and coordinating with several outside jurisdictions." The investigator from Tennessee could not be reached Tuesday afternoon.

Hall said the investigator in Tennessee told her that the truck stop off Interstate 40 from where Weller last used his phone is known for having cargo stolen while drivers are away from their rigs.

"There would have been an altercation," Hall said. "My son would have tried to protect his cargo (if he caught a thief in the act)."

Tennessee was among the top 10 states for cargo theft in 2011 and 2012, according to FreightWatch International, which monitors cargo security. FreightWatch's Global Cargo Theft Threat Assessment 2012 said only 2.2 percent of all cargo thefts in the United States involved violence.

According to his mother, Weller stayed in close contact while on the road. She said he would call frequently and let her know where he was, when he was leaving and when he expected to be back in Colorado.

Police told Hall that investigators had narrowed the possibilities to foul play or her son simply wanting to become missing. She swears that the latter is outside of her son's character.